A live video was posted on Facebook by a girl whose boyfriend Philando Castile was shot by a police officer in Minnesota. The video was taken down by Facebook for which they later blamed a technical glitch as the reason. Facebook’s act has been criticised on a global level.
News about manhunt by police officers is now a common sight on various media platforms. Be it the Alton Sterling shooting case in Baton Rouge, Louisiana or the Philando Castile shooting in Minnesota. What’s common in these two cases is that the victims failed to fit in the racial group of the police officers.The Castile case made it to the limelight when his girlfriend Diamond Lavish Reynolds live streamed the immediate moments after the shootout on Facebook. Unfortunately, the Zuckerberg-founded company was quick to take down the video.
According to his girlfriend, what exactly happened is that Castile was shot in his car by a police officer at a traffic stop in Falcon Heights. At that time, his car was pulled over by the police officer for broken taillight and he was approaching for his driver’s licence.
“He killed my boyfriend”, said Reynolds. “He let the officer know that he had a firearm, and he was reaching for his wallet, and the officer just shot him in his arm.”
It seems as if Facebook forgot that other video sharing platforms do exist. The video was reuploaded on Youtube and Twitter in no time.
In the live footage, Reynolds was able to capture the moments happened immediately after Castile was shot by an unknown police officer. She was explaining the scene in the video as Castile was drowning in the wetland of death. After the incident, Reynolds was handcuffed and forced to sit in the back of a police vehicle along with her daughter. Castile was taken to a hospital where he took his last breath.
The saddening story did make into the political ears of the Minnesota government. Mark Dayton, the Governor of state, kept his view that the racial difference could be a prime cause in the Philando Castile shooting.
“Would this have happened if those passengers, the driver and the passengers, were white?” said Dayton (D). “I don’t think it would have. So I’m forced to confront, and I think all of us in Minnesota are forced to confront, that this kind of racism exists,” – reports WSJ.
The video was resuscitated by Facebook after an hour but with a “disturbing” warning message. Facebook has presented their defence in a statement made to TechCrunch. “We’re very sorry that the video was temporarily inaccessible. It was down due to a technical glitch and restored as soon as we were able to investigate,” – said a Facebook spokesperson.
The Facebook boss, Mark Zuckerberg has been a sensitive person while expressing his views about the shootout. “My heart goes out to the Castile family and all the other families who have experienced this kind of tragedy. My thoughts are also with all members of the Facebook community who are deeply troubled by these events,” wrote Zuckerberg.
“Technical Glitch” is the term they have used to justify the takedown of a video that was an evidence of a deadly massacre. Facebook wants to peep into, or I should say, control people’s lives. They control how feeds and videos travel across the website. That’s acceptable. But showing your Idiocy in such hard times is an act of disgrace.
Watch the “disturbing” video uploaded by Reynolds: